Consider Impact Of Easing Admission

School Board members should give careful consideration to the potential negative impacts of School Superintendent Art Johnson's revised high school magnet entry requirements.

Relaxing entry criteria will create a larger pool of "qualified" students. With more students in the lottery, but with no additional places in the affected programs, more students will be denied entry to the district's top academic programs. Even under the previous criteria, there were more students desiring access and too few seats. This plan will only disappoint more Palm Beach County students.

If increased access is indeed the real outcome desired by Dr. Johnson and members of the School Board, then, as Mr. Dreyfoos has suggested, instituting a second-tier program may be a part of a more comprehensive and longer-term solution.

It certainly seems to me that any solution must not only include more seats, but also a strengthening of existing elementary and middle school curriculum to better prepare more students for success in these highly rigorous high school magnet programs. Implemented over time, this might be the best solution for all our children.